The Unplugging of Phase & Orion
by v-volatile
Summary: Look, I'm totally sick of fics involving new characters who are all hackers, so here's one about people being unplugged who aren't hackers. Not a romance. Serves as a bit of background for my other Matrix fiction.


~~~~you have entered the void~~~~  
  
~~this fanfic is called::.:::.::~~  
  
THE UNPLUGGING OF PHASE & ORION  
  
A background fic to: Left Behind and Short Circuit  
  
What I really should be writing is a Tamora Pierce fic, instead of these numerous Matrix ones, (Because I have a friend on my back about how much the Matrix sucks. She hates it.) But whatever. Tamora Pierce is complex and has about 25 characters, and I love the Matrix far more than I love Tamora Pierce books...so...here's another Matrix fic.  
  
And also I am now DISCLAIMING all the shit(e) I may steal from the movie in this fic: I know, I know, Morpheus and Trinity and Neo and the whole movie plot and stuff belong to the Wachowski's and the WB. So don't sue me! (I am really worth nothing.) And God knows doing this isn't earning me a penny either....  
  
I do own the characters of: Phase, Orion, Era, Romy, and Mars. No thieving please.  
  
Here's a hint: If the plot seems fragmented to you or you do not understand certain aspects, I highly recommend you read these, my background fics: Short Circuit and Left Behind. (I know, it requires effort and so forth, but do it anyway. My reviewers say they're okay. Decent.)  
  
Special thanx to...all my reviewers who did the proper thing: reviewed my crap, and subsequently got on my ass to make me write this. Because various people have expressed how they like the characters of Phase and Orion.  
  
***  
  
A thin, fit-looking girl with green eyes and thick, shoulder-length red hair takes the subway every day. She takes the C train, at 4:09 PM every day. Seven days a week, very nearly fifty-two weeks in the year. She shoplifts from the CVS on the corner down from the subway station at 4:13 every day, then steals from some other specialty shops down the street. Then she moves on back home, using the D train, at 4:34. She has a monthly subway pass. She is lonely.  
  
A dark-skinned, muscular young man with short dark hair takes the subway for one hour every day from 3:45 to 4:45. He takes the C train. And every day he walks to the edge of the street and goes behind the abandoned hotel on the corner, next to the CVS, and paints his message on the wall. In neon spray-paint. He has gotten caught four times. He has been arrested twice. He has discreetly freed himself from the holding cell at the police station but once. He has a monthly subway pass. He is lonely.  
  
The girl's name is Lauren, and she lives in a shabby-two room apartment across from the C train station back in her neighborhood. She has a computer and a printer, and a very fast Internet connection, even though she doesn't need it. She works as a gardener for a rich old woman who lives in a brownstone uptown.  
  
The man's name is Aaron and he lives in a slightly nicer apartment in a section of town very far from where Lauren lives. He takes the C train to get to work every morning and to go home each night, except when he stops to graffiti. He works as a maitre d' in a restaurant for richer people uptown.  
  
Very typical, isn't it.  
  
Well, they have been sitting next to one another on the same car of the same train at the same time for three years and have not once said a single word, either in question or in greeting.  
  
"Who are you? You ride this train every afternoon. I'm curious," Aaron said, one afternoon, at 4:11. Lauren looked startled.  
  
"I'm a thief," She said, the words leaping out of her mouth. Aaron showed no emotion. Inwardly Lauren swore.  
  
"What do you steal?" He asked, completely unruffled.  
  
"I'm not telling you," Lauren responded, taken aback.  
  
"Okay," He said, hands slightly raised from his lap in innocence.  
  
"Who are you?" Lauren asked after a moment of silence.  
  
"I'm a vandal," Aaron said slowly. The train rocked back and forth around a turn. Lauren grabbed onto a bar next to her to keep from falling off the plastic bench.  
  
"What do you vandalize?" Lauren asked.  
  
"Everything. The world," Aaron responded.  
  
"Are you up for a contract?" Lauren asked, eyes gleaming.  
  
"What?"  
  
"You could follow me. I could steal and then you could vandalize. We could work together," Lauren explained.  
  
"Do you mean I could vandalize what you stole?" Aaron asked, missing the point.  
  
"No. Vandalize where I stole it from," Lauren said.  
  
"Maybe. I'm afraid. I don't know you at all. You might get me arrested. And I couldn't get my message out." Aaron said wearily. But he felt no threat from anywhere. Lauren's eyes were calm.  
  
"I wouldn't do that. Then I'd be arrested, too. What's your message?" Lauren said with the beginning of a smile.  
  
"My message is stop paying attention," Aaron said flatly.  
  
"What?" Lauren asked.  
  
"That's the message. Stop paying attention," Aaron said.  
  
"What happens if I take your advice?" Lauren queried.  
  
"You see things behind the walls, and get visions. Try it sometime," Aaron said, leaning in and making scarily direct eye contact with Lauren.  
  
"Why do you steal things?" Aaron asked, looking out the window.  
  
"I steal to get my message out."  
  
"What's that?"  
  
"Simple. Nothing is permanent," It was 4:13. The train pulled up to Lauren's stop. Lauren strode out the open doors.  
  
***  
  
"Her!" Neo said, pointing into the code. At that time, the crew was Morpheus,  
  
Tank, Neo, Trinity, and Slip. A lonely five, who had been looking for additional coppertops for a while. They were gathered around the operator's station, Tank in his chair calling up statistics and recordings.  
  
"Oh. Lauren Richmond. The lone thief. I've been watching her since she's so detached. Her lack of roots is disturbing," Morpheus said.  
  
"Did you notice that? She just spoke to that man on the subway for the first time in three years," Slip said, shocked, eyes wide open.  
  
"Yes...did you see...a two minute conversation? Morpheus," Trinity whispered, attracting everyone's attention, "He's detached just the same as she is."  
  
"I know," Tank said. "Weird, ain't it? Here...the guy's name is...uh, Aaron Makson," He continued, pointing to a profile on a far monitor.  
  
"I see. And he's a...vandal. He's a waiter someplace, and...a vandal. I don't get it," Neo said, shaking his head, perplexed.  
  
"Patience, Neo. These people are rare specimens. They are detached, somehow, and they do not have the lives we did in the Matrix. They aren't hackers or programmers or lost souls. I think they sense the fake quality of their surroundings. This is very, very rare," Morpheus said quietly, and everyone leaned in as Tank opened a recording on a screen directly in front of him.  
  
"Watch their lips move. Aaron just said... `That's the message. Stop paying attention' and Lauren responded...um... `steal to get my message out', and then...wait- what was that....maybe, `nothing is...permanent?'" Tank said slowly, peering closely at the code and trying to interpret the words of each person. His mouth fell open.  
  
"Wow. You're right. They see something...I- I move to unplug them," Trinity said carefully, pacing her words and looking at Morpheus. She straightened. He met her gaze.  
  
"One at a time. I want to pull them out, too...but we have to take things slow. One at a time. Neo, Trinity, Slip and I will go in today, Tank. We are going to retrieve the girl, Lauren Richmond. If she chooses not to come, we'll try Mr. Makson. Let's go, everyone," Morpheus said and they turned to the loading chairs behind them. Neo and Trinity had chairs next to one another. Neo went to lay back and Trinity seized his arm. Their eyes locked. Neo leaned up and kissed her. Tank obediently averted his gaze and plugged in Morpheus and Slip, as Neo quietly whispered `I love you' at Trinity.  
  
***  
  
"Get in," Trinity, said as Slip pulled a sleek black car up to the foot of the steps of Lauren's shoddy apartment building. She and Neo stood on either side of Lauren. Morpheus walked ahead of them, on the phone with Tank.  
  
"Where are you taking me? Are you from the police? I swear, the only things I stole were little things from the drugstore...please! Tell me where we are going!" Lauren cried, struggling against Neo's grip. The three of them- Lauren, Trinity and Neo- climbed into the back of the spacious sedan and shut the door. Morpheus sat in the front passenger seat.  
  
"You know nothing's permanent, Lauren. Things are about to change. Drastically," Trinity said, and, noting the look of horror in Lauren's eyes, added, "We're not the police. We're form around here. And about the things you stole- they don't matter. Pretend none of that was real, Lauren. Because none of it was. You have to trust us, please."  
  
"What are you talking about? How do you know I said that nothing's permanent?" Lauren demanded, angry and confused.  
  
"We have been watching you. Ever get the feeling...Lauren...that something's wrong with everything? That there is an underlying sense of restlessness in everyone, like they're awaiting the hour of reprisal?" Neo said, leaning closer to Lauren and meeting her stare. Her response was tiny, almost inaudible and it made Trinity's spine grow cold. Slip held his breath and Morpheus gazed peacefully out the window, head bowed.  
  
"Yes," Lauren whispered, shocked.  
  
"Everything's gonna fall into place, very soon. Just wait. Morpheus will explain when we get where we're going," Neo said. Neo glanced sidelong at Trinity and the code suddenly changed. Trinity's hands felt warm.  
  
"I don't know anything anymore," Lauren said, and Slip turned a curve, causing everyone in the car to lurch to one side. When they pulled up in front of the abandoned building that served as a base for Morpheus & company, Lauren was quickly hustled into the building.  
  
"What's going on?" Lauren asked when trinity grabbed her arm and pulled her inside, revealing a nicely sized handgun and locking the door behind her. Neo walked through a wall- Lauren's eyes grew to the size of dinner plates- muttering to himself, `agent, agent'. Trinity's eyes grew dark with worry when the sound of fighting and gunfire permeated the building's lobby. But the three fighters pulled Lauren along, up dusty, narrow staircases, to a room with a brown and white chequered floor, one small black table, and two gray armchairs. Morpheus sat in one, Slip and Trinity stood near the door, guns drawn. He motioned Lauren to the other armchair, and hesitantly she sat down.  
  
"I have a choice for you. There is a glitch in reality. It's called the Matrix. Most people notice it through computers or machines- for that was how it was first created- but you are unique, Lauren Richmond. You aren't a hacker or a programmer and yet you still feel the glitch, nudging the back of your thoughts, do you not?" Morpheus said, removing the bullet-colored pill case from his pocket. A glass of water appeared on the table. Lauren's mouth fell open.  
  
"This red pill," Morpheus opened the case and set the gel cap on the table, "will show you the glitch, and, more importantly, rid you of it." Lauren's gaze focused on the pill. Her pupils sharpened. "This blue pill will erase your memory of being informed of the glitch. Take this and you'll wake up back in the system, without an inkling of its existence," Morpheus continued, and set the blue pill down on the other side of the water glass. Black from the varnish of the table shone through each pill. But a tiny shard of light reflecting from Morpheus' sunglasses made the red pill look brighter for just a fraction of a second. Lauren saw the flash. **Nothing is permanent.** Her subconscious shouted, somehow...and her hand moved of its own volition to grasp the red pill.  
  
"I'll go with you," She said.  
  
When the water glass was empty, the pill consumed, the only thing lying in the medical chair in the next room was Lauren's uninhabited RSI, and the pieces of the mirror were flowing with liquid reality, Neo returned from fighting and eradicating the code of the agents. A phone on the shiny black table of the room with the chequered floor served as a hardline. One by one the four freedom fighters dissolved into thin reality and woke up on the Nebuchadnezzar.  
  
***  
  
Some number of days later...  
  
***  
  
Aaron was walking to the subway station, slowly, deliberately, going home. He got on the train and turned around, preparing to see the familiar girl sitting there. When he found no one, he stifled a gasp. His vision focused past the spot where she had once sat and he stopped paying attention. Nothing was permanent...so neither was she. But Aaron found himself wondering why she wasn't there and wanting to get more conversation from her. He had burning questions. Such as, why was she convinced that `nothing was permanent' and why did she steal things?  
  
As he was thinking, a pale, dark-haired man in a black suit walked onto the subway at the next stop. He sat down in the girl thief's former spot. He looked at Aaron for a moment and then removed the pair of black-framed tinted sunglasses he'd been wearing.  
  
"Is your name Aaron Makson?" The man asked. He had very calm eyes. Disturbingly calm eyes.  
  
"Who's asking?" Aaron said and raised an eyebrow. He desperately wished that the silent thief girl were in the seat in front of him, not this suspicious authoritative stranger.  
  
"Friends. Ever heard of these people: Neo? Morpheus? Trinity?" The stranger asked.  
  
"Um, no. Are you with the police?" Aaron asked, suspiciously, tensing as if he was ready to get up and run. The names held power. He could hear it in the man's deep, confident voice.  
  
"I'm not an authority. Far from it," The man said. "I am Neo. And I have one question for you," he continued.  
  
"What?" Aaron asked, slightly less suspicious but still on his guard.  
  
"Mr. Makson...is there something wrong here? With this train? Sure, it's on time, and running properly, and it seems real...but can you feel something is...unbalanced?" Neo asked Aaron.  
  
"My thief is gone. She used to sit there," Aaron said, pointing to Neo's seat.  
  
"What was her name?" Neo asked, smiling a little. Aaron didn't understand.  
  
"I don't know. She never told me. We only talked once, but I'd like to see her again," Aaron explained, eyeing the grating on the floor of the subway car.  
  
"She came with us, Aaron. Her name was Lauren Richmond. She's your thief. If you'd like to visit her, you can come with me and we'll find her. I know where she is right now in fact," Neo continued, rising as the train lurched to a stop. Aaron almost tripped but Neo never moved, rapidly changing Matrix code to compensate for the lack of balance. Aaron stared. The doors opened to his right. "Let's go," Neo said, and wordlessly Aaron followed.  
  
***  
  
"Did you kidnap her? Is she alright?" Aaron asked when they began walking down the street.  
  
"Oh, no, it's nothing like that. She was in danger and we freed her, actually. She came willingly. Lauren's not the type you can force things on easily," Neo said, his tone low and even. He turned a corner into an alley, where Trinity, Lauren and Slip stood against the wall, waiting.  
  
"This is Trinity. And Slip. And Lauren. Lauren...this is your vandal from the subway. His name is Aaron Makson. He wanted to see if you were alright when you missed the train," Neo explained and stepped away. The two stared blankly for a moment.  
  
"I saw your work on the wall once, by a stop on line C. You're an artist, I think," Lauren said, awkward about calling him by his first or last name.  
  
"Not quite," Aaron responded. "So how did you meet Neo, and these people?" He asked, gesturing towards the three who stood looking silently at one another.  
  
"They found me. And look, they found you too. Did they explain about the glitch yet?" Lauren asked. Trinity stepped in.  
  
"I think she's getting ahead of herself. The glitch is something else entirely. Ever felt that something's...off, Mr. Makson?" Trinity said.  
  
"Yes...and no," Aaron said, wondering if this was some kind of cult.  
  
"This is what's off." Trinity spat the words. She turned and allowed Aaron a clear view of Neo who was facing the wall further down the alley. His left hand rose up and went through the bricks of the wall. He kept it there a heartbeat and then pulled it out, holding one brick intact. Distastefully he dropped it.  
  
Aaron stood stock still, utterly shocked. "Trust them," Lauren whispered.  
  
"This red pill," Trinity said, opening her hand to reveal the bullet-colored pill case, "Will show you the glitch, which we call the Matrix. Take this and you will be rid of it." Aaron's gaze focused on the pill. His pupils sharpened. "This blue pill will erase your memory of being informed of the glitch. Take this and you'll wake up back in the system, without an inkling of its existence," Trinity said, removing the two pills and placing them parallel to one another on her plain white palm. She strode towards Aaron, hand outstretched, shaking slightly. The blue pill rolled a bit, almost imperceptibly, but Aaron saw it. He looked up and met the haunted eyes of each person in the alley- Trinity, Lauren, Neo, and the man they called Slip. From them there was an air of underlying calm- calm tinged with confident arrogance in Neo's case- much more different from the underlying panic and fear of other people he'd seen before.  
  
**They're out of the glitch.** The simple though hit him like a thousand-pound sin.  
  
He took the red pill, ate it dry and allowed himself to be taken away from the alley, into a building where some computers and medical things were attached to his neck, arm, and stomach. Trinity and her calm, cold, hands made him lie back...until he saw the mirror melt and reached for it. Then lying back didn't do anything anymore, and he was suddenly aware of the glitch -of its size and complexity, and the fear coming from the other pods in the Real World was enough to drown him. Something pulled ropelike cords from metallic engraved holes in his back and neck- and then the fear drowned him.  
  
He blacked out soon afterwards, and when he came to he found himself sleeping in the belly of a metal monster, with Lauren, Neo and a black man he'd never seen before hovering anxiously over his weak, prone form.  
  
Not once was he afraid.  
  
***  
  
"Aaron. Whoa, I can't keep calling you that. It sounds strange," Slip said as he, and Neo and Lauren and Aaron ate dinner in the mess hall. Tank was talking with Morpheus while on watch.  
  
"And why not? It's his name, right?" Lauren said.  
  
"We've got a custom here," Trinity said. "We always pick new names when unplugged from the power plant. To show we are free from our pasts. Most people use their hacker names, but you don't have hacker names, so you'll have to make them up," Trinity said. Lauren and Aaron looked at one another, confused a moment.  
  
"Something about change. Hmm...I remember we learned about phase changes in high school chemistry. So...I think I will be...Phase," Lauren said.  
  
"My dad was an astronomer. He looked at and mapped constellations. But they weren't real- were they? Hmm. I will be...Orion because Orion's Belt is just like this whole war. Looks simple from far away but complex if you're standing inside it," Aaron said.  
  
That's how the Nebuchadnezzar gained Phase and Orion. They came, as someone else; changed, swapped, (whatever,) without the help and clarification or computers and shining green code. They became fighters, uncaring about programming. They knew just enough technology to get by.  
  
Phase was skilled with firearms, while Orion was great at anticipating other people's moves, anticipating and interpreting emotions and conflict, and also proficient in hand-to-hand combat.  
  
FIN.  
  
Please, tell me how you like it. Review- review- review!!!!! I don't know about flames though...I assume they'll be used to cook my Thai Coconut Ginger rice for tomorrow's breakfast.  
  
Thanx a lot,  
  
V_volatile 


End file.
